Night Fury made sure she traveled a good enough distance so she could be out of hearing range and sight for a while. She continued walking deeper into the forest for a few more minutes before finally stopping. She waited out there for a while.
She instantly noticed the shadowy movements around her. Ghostly apparitions appeared before her, followed by ponies who looked deformed and decayed. One of them caught her attention. He had pitch black eyes and metal claws, teeth, and bone projections on his body. They all started to close in and surround her. Before they could get any closer they suddenly backed away.
Entering in from the all consuming darkness was a very tall, skeletal, pale white, pony wearing a suit with black writhing tendrils on it's back. The creature had a tail and main materialized from pure darkness, it's cutie mark was that of a circle with an X over it, and most of all was that it had no face.
The creature walked up to her and nuzzled her. She nuzzled it back.
"It's been far too long, my son," it made a purring growl as it continued to nuzzle her.
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Shining Armor was using up all of his willpower to make sure he didn't panic. He had lost sight of night fury. The whispers began sounding menacing and he could swear that at the edge of his sight he could see movement.
He finally was able to see the pony he was looking for. 'Why is she just standing there?' Still being suspicious of her he decided to wait and see.
And he waited.
And he waited.
And he waited.
And he waited.
And he waited.
And he waited.
And he waited.
'Okay I've now clearly run out of patience!' He stomped towards her.
"Night Fury!" she licked her lips in anticipation. "Night Fury. Do you know how dangerous it is to be out here?!" he turned her around and grabbed her by the shoulders. Despite the fact that she can suppress herself from blushing, she let herself blush. "Why are you even out here anyways?" he questioned.
"Nothing, just...killing two birds with one stone," one of shining armor's eyebrows rose in a questioning manner. "and one of those little birdies is you," shining armor's eyes widened. 'Crap have I been playing into her hooves the entire time?!' "I could hear your heart beat," she stated.
"Should have known," he then noticed the red on her cheeks, "Are...are you...blushing?" he asked, in a bit of a shock, as he never saw her blush before.
"You obviously know why," she replied in a sultry voice. He found out he was making physical contact with her of his own accord. He released her as if she was carrying a flesh eating disease. Night Fury, knowing he would react like this, lunged forward and nipped him in the neck. Taken by surprise from this he shoved her away and placed a hoof on his neck, near the area where she bit into him with her fangs.
"What did you do?" he looked at her and saw a blue mass swirling around her fangs. In a frantic motion he removed the armor on his arm and gasped in terror. Before his terrified eyes he could see blue traveling through his veins and down his arm. He began to feel light-headed, his vision burred, his legs felt like they were carrying something that was one pound too much. He collapsed. 'Is this it? Am I going to die like this?' The darkness took him.
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Shining felt cold. 'Huh looks like those theorists were right. Death does feel cold,' He suddenly felt warm. 'Hmph, must be that light,' Something touched his face. It came back. 'Whatever you are go away' It persisted. It came again. It came back again, this time it took it's time and came back again. And again.
And again.
And again.
And again.
Out of anger and, mostly, annoyance he, instead of waving it away, grabbed it and attempted to squish it in his grip. It felt like hair. 'Wait how am I supposed to be feeling anything without a body? Unless' He opened his eyes. What he grabbed was a blue tail with a strange, glowing black streak. He followed it and winded up looking at night fury's plot. She smirked as he looked at her plot.
"AHHHH!" He stood up. She chuckled at his reaction.
"Jeez, your sister could probably read you better than I can," she chuckled some more.
"What the hell was that? You bit me in the neck! I thought you killed me by poisoning me!"
"Oh would you relax I was only yanking your chain...Besides...I haven't killed the little birdie just yet," his eyes widened again.
"What are you implying now?" he said, wanting things to just be over.
"Oh, you know exactly what I'm implying," she said with a sultry voice. He realized something. He could feel the coldness in the air and the heat from the fireplace. He was without his armor! He realized something else. He slowly turned his head towards night fury. He was able to see her entire body without her armor! 'I bet I'm the only one who ever saw her without her armor on'
Her entire coat was shiny, hence her birthright as a crystal pony, and smooth. Her overall body was the size of a normal mare, albeit with a slightly muscular build. Then something else got his attention. That something else was her cutie-mark. The inner region was a green circle with a blue inverted pentagram over it and a red, slit, pupil-like streak over both of them. Four blue tendrils extended from the circle indicating an X underneath it. The same blue inverted pentagram was in the spacing between each tendril. The only thing different was that they were smaller. A second circle was formed by a blue line, perfectly touching the tips of the tendrils. The last thing was that the entire cutie-mark was in two huge black bat-wings outlined with red.
"Like what you see?" he instantly turned away when he realized he was staring to long. Then it hit him. He started shaking his head,
"No. No, that is not going to happen," he stated to the bat-pony.
"I'm not giving you much choice. If you try to run I can instantly catch you. I have the advantages of echolocation, flight, and stealth. So take your pick," shining armor started pondering about his chances and the odds stacked against him. 'If I make a run for it I'll get raped, but she is the last pony I would have sex.' "Tell you what, until this whole alien thing is over, I'll leave you, your sister, and your wife alone," 'That sounds like a good deal, but then again...' "I'm not stupid, I won't make any jokes or imply anything of this,"
"Ugh, if your going to have sex with me, i.e. by cornering me into a position where both! options are horrible, I might as well get something in return for cooperating,"
"Hubba-hubba,"
"Just get it over with!" shining armor will most definitely not like this. He will remember for the rest of his life that this night is the most worst, awful, and horrible night.
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Soarin had finally stopped being scared of the place. He was now reminiscing about his past during the military campaigns he participated in. The Black Operations. The Assassinations. The kill count. And the name.
"80 confirmed kills. 479 confirmed kills. 1,356 confirmed kills," he whispered how many enemies he killed in action or have been known to be slain by him through their wounds. "5,743 confirmed kills," he started checking his armor.
It was modified to fit his specific needs. The right side was heavier, carrying a shoulder pauldron, providing extra protection to his chest as well, with a retractable steel claw formed from five blades with prongs, each ending where the part of blade is able to bend and flex.
"9,182 confirmed kills,"
Strangely, the claw was able mimic the actions of an actual human hand! Alongside the steel claw was a built in flechette launcher that fired, not one, but three barbed thin darts with razor sharp wire, allowing it to act like a whip. Holstered on his back was a glaive, basically a handle with two huge blades on both ends, and one of the prototype weapons he's carrying.
"10,368 confirmed kills,"
He remembered being approached by S.W.O.R.D. operatives. S.W.O.R.D.
Special
Warfare and Weapons
Operation unit for
Research and
Development programs
The foundation for the SWORD program was it's original predecessor the New Army program. It is basically the same thing, except they now develop weapons in secrecy and created next-generation soldiers. He was one of lucky candidates chosen.
"Huh, lucky. Yeah right," he looked at his claw. He remembered what pinkie had said about it.
"Your claw looks like James' claws when they're fully upgraded from prototype 2!"
He chuckled, "Who the hell is James and what's prototype 2," he then remembered being told by her friends to ignore her since she can be random at times. Soarin closed eyes again and reminisced about a specific mission during the past five years.
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Soarin was sent in to aid some celestial soldiers that were in a cave before contact was lost. He was currently prowling in a system of tunnels searching for any signs of life. Taking careful steps to avoid making any noise and alerting any hostiles, he made his way to a large area. It was like being in the center of ant hive, there were many tunnels and holes to choose from.
Soarin didn't need to choose any. Using his elemental ability, wind and air, he created small breezes and made them go through the entire network of tunnels, each one acting as a feeler for him.
Once he felt the shape of a pony he focused all of his feelers on one tunnel and advanced.
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"What the heck was that?"
"Its just the wind. Get back to work,"
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"AHHHHHHHHHHHH!" soarin screamed in blind rage as he stabbed at a cult member for the fifth time.
Soarin had found the soldiers.
They had been mutilated and barely recognizable.
The cult for their namesake was attempting some sort of appeasement to entities of sorts; they attempted to summon, capture, and overall seal them inside golem-like statues. These specific entities were known to be un-resting, always angry, and had been consumed by their lust for vengeance long ago.
In order to summon them though, they had to spill the blood of lives that would go un-avenged and of the innocent and they payed the price for it.
For this, the cult members had been slaughtered without mercy.
One was a vampony. High-ranking cult members are transformed into vamponies through gene splicing and genetic manipulation. Rather than just magically transforming themselves the cult thought it better to be related through blood and DNA to a creature so well known to be nocturnal.
This particular vampony was sadistic. He took pleasure in bleeding his enemies with his whip full of blades.
Soarin had to admit he enjoyed hearing him gurgle on his own blood as he strangled him with his own whip.
His body know lay hanging with his whip acting as a noose.
Another was impaled with multiple flechettes.
One was on the ground with four scratch marks: two on his face and two on his chest.
There was a headless body in a pool of blood.
Others had wounds that suggested soarin had stabbed them with his glaive.
He looked to his side and saw a cultist running. He quickly removed the double-bladed weapon from the corpse, held it in a throwing position, and threw. It hit it's target, the blade going through his skull and pinning the rest of the body to the wall of the cavern.
He looked behind him and saw two this time. He unhooked two of his chakram discs and hurled them.
The pony to the left was shoved into the wall, the throwing disc embedded in the side of his skull.
The pony to the right got a ginormous gash on his neck, nearly decapitating him, causing him to bleed out and die.
A shadow towered over him. He looked up and saw one of the golems raising it's arm with a huge mace. Soarin remembered this one it was very stubborn; stubborner than the other two that were captured and placed inside the golem statues.
The golems looked like slightly giant sculptures of a muscular pony, except they only had the shape, no facial features what so ever. They were colored stone black with glowing purple drawings all over their body with a pronounced center on the chest. It was a dead give away as a weakness.
This golem had lost it's left arm when soarin slashed an X over it's chest, weakening it and slashed upwards across it's right eye, then clinged to it's back and started unloading an entire clip into it.
The golem was bleeding from it's wounds the purple liquid dripping to the floor, making a repeating 'pat' sound as the thick substance landed on the ground. It looked at soarin as it missed it's intended target.
Soarin looked down to his right. There was a higher-up's dead body; it was covered in multiple cuts, had it's head and right arm cut off, and it had been gutted from the neck down at a vertical angle.
He picked up the sword that was next to the cadaver; it had a gold handle with a red enchantment gem in the center. The entire sword was made out of black and dark blue crystal, imitating a dragon breathing blue fire. 'This well do the trick,'
They both stared down each other, analyzing the surrounding area and their opponents, waiting for right time to catch each other off guard.
Soarin swirled the sword so it could be in a reverse-grip and put one hoof forward.
They both started to circle each other.
The golem started to drag the mace on the ground, attempting to distract him with the sound of metal grinding against rock.
At the same time they both sprinted forward: the golem swung wide in order to swat him to the side, but soarin, the more nimble one, slid underneath it and cut a gash in it's leg.
As the golem knelt down soarin rolled onto his fours, got upright and charged.
The golem blindly swung overhead. Soarin saw this coming and jumped, landing on the handle after the mace had crashed on the ground and lept forward, plunging the sword into the golem's chest. The glow in the drawings ceased and the life drained out of the golem.
By the end of it all soarin was covered in red and purple and so began his five years of endless killcounts and the stories of the Whisper of Death.
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"You seemed troubled," soarin opened his eyes to find a female changeling in front of him. He mentally sighed. She wasn't any ordinary changeling though.
"Come along Viper we have a few more specimens to record," Nosferatu implored, he was nicknamed this because he studied and based his work on parasites or symbiotic creatures, relatively any organism that required a host to survive. As vamponies required blood from ponies similar to leeches and mosquitoes it was a no-brain-er and soon the Romane word meaning vampony started surfacing.
He took a strange liking to name and discarded his previous one for it. Now Nosferatu took a few cliche/classic elements of vampony lore. He dressed formally with a few pieces of medieval-styled armor to go with it. Nosferatu was only armed with two weapons: a regular shiny, silver, broad sword with Japonese text on them-rumors state that he had a run-in with fluttershy there. The other weapon was a single large pistol with high caliber projectiles. The entire pistol was a shiny black color with glowing glyphs and symbols.
Soarin, however saw through this facade.
In truth Nosferatu only has bug, insect, and arachnid DNA/Genes spliced into his own. Noferatu was notoriously known for a few things: his hunting trips, his hooded robe, and being a practitioner of dark magic.
On his hunting trips he always left behind empty husks from the animals and his hooded robe was seen placing itself on him or blowing in the wind.
As stated before: soarin saw through this. The hooded robe was actually gigantic moth wings; their huge size and fur caused the 'flapping' sound whenever Nosferatu flew, he has fangs but that was most likely from spider DNA or natural-changeling-fangs, and the empty husks were obviously from the manner in which he feeds in.
Giant Water Bugs feed in a manner very much like Nosferatu: they inject venom into their prey that liquefies their insides and then drink up liquids, leaving behind an empty husk. So it is evident that Nosferatu spliced in a giant water bug's DNA.
And as for Viper. There wasn't much known about her only that she spliced in DNA from female insects. There were two outcomes from this: 1. her nickname and 2. she had a constant urge to mate.
Much to his dismay she was relentless.
"I'm pretty sure I'm right where want to be," as she finished saying this she started licking Soarin's neck with her forked tongue.
Nosferatu simply ignored this and left.
"You know its actually meaningless by now since you haven't even succeeded in any of your previous attempts," soarin stated in hopes of dissuading her.
"You know its quite rude a thing to say something like that to a girl," she said, turning her attention from his neck to look directly at him with her green slit eyes. Soarin sighed.
Viper decided to start teasing his ear.
Soarin decided to wait her out until she fell asleep. He laid against a tree and laid Viper on his chest--Not having much of a choice because she started clinging to him.
Soarin could feel all the paranormal entities swirling around their entire group, but what was weird was that they always steered clear of a certain area. It was almost as if something was there, something 'physical'.
Whatever it was it felt ancient, hungry, and......undying. He held Viper tighter and she snuggled up to him, moaned, and smiled before keeping still once more.
"Psychological Warfare," he stated.
Soarin closed his eyes.
This thing felt savage and insatiable, yet it had a strange aura of intelligence.
He prayed it was just him losing his grip on reality due to his military career and the constant violence and bloodshed.